


For Thirsting Hearts Let Waters Flow

by LourdesDeath



Series: The Light That in Us Burns [2]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Dehydration, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Starvation, The thirst is real
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 13:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10308932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LourdesDeath/pseuds/LourdesDeath
Summary: Percival Graves is dying of thirst. Literally.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from From Ashes to the Living Font by Alan J Hommerding.

The sun shines through the curtains and onto his face. It hurts as the light digs into his eyes like knives, and he squeezes them shut against the assault.

Sometimes, it seems that’s all the fighting he could do here.

The door is closed, and has been for…

How long has it been this time?

Percival looks at the door, and could have sworn the doorknob is turning.

He holds his breath, waiting for…

But why would it be moving so slowly? Grindelwald tortured him by locking him in this damn room or simply using the cruciatus curse on him, not by opening the door so slowly he couldn’t even tell it if was moving.

It’s been days. Or months. Maybe it’s been hours.

He isn’t sure how long it’s been. The days blend together sometimes, bleeding into a mass of nothingness that was too intermixed for him to identify separate days or minutes or years.

He opens his eyes, realizing they had closed. His head aches badly enough that he wonders if Grindelwald somehow cast _crucio_ on him but only aimed it at his brain.

His legs blur in front of him, momentarily turning into shadows before snapping back together. He wonders if his magic is trying to come back, to save him before it’s too late, but it’s impossible.

Percival waits for him Grindelwald to return, waits for his face—the way his face should look, if he could shave or cut his hair or just get a drop of water on his tongue—to come and taunt him. He’d do anything for water, for food.

His heart drums in his temples, so loud he wonders if the noise is echoing in the room, or if maybe (just _maybe_ ) Grindelwald has return to save him.

The doorknob starts turning again, and Percival looks away.

It’s not real—it’s _never_ real—and he can’t bring himself to hope again. He’ll die in this damn room.

The curtains flutter in a nonexistent wind, letting more burning light into his eyes.

Percival turns his head away again, and freezes.

The door is—

The door is _open_.

He can see the living room, the coffee table and sofa.

A man stands in the doorway, his eyes wide as he stares down at Percival.

He’s beautiful, tall and lithe and perfect, his red hair falling into his blue eyes.

Percival would have been happy to die earlier than this, if the specter who would collect him and bring him to whatever afterlife awaits was so lovely.  

The man rushes forward, his coat fanning out behind him like wings.

Percival gasps as cool fingers touch his burning face, and he looks into those eyes again. They’re even more beautiful this close, promising the refreshment of water Percival craves. He wonders if the man’s pink lips are as soft as he imagines when they open.

“Director Graves? Director Graves, can you hear me?” they say, and he nods.

 _Loud and clear_ , he wants to say, but his throat sticks together, catching the words.

The man reaches into a pocket and pulls out… a bowtruckle.

He wouldn’t have guessed that an angel of death would have a bowtruckle in their pocket, but he supposes it’s not his place to question that.

The bowtruckle is deposited on his shoulder, and it climbs up his arm.

The man touches his face again, leading his gaze away from the bowtruckle.

He’s holding a metal cup and pointing his wand into it.

“ _Aguamenti_ ,” he murmurs, and a shameful noise tears from Percival’s throat as water pours out of his wand, collecting in the cup.

He wants to plead, to beg for this not to be another torture, but the man doesn’t even give him a chance to do so. The wand is captured between the man’s teeth and one cool hand returns to his face while the other leads the cup to his lips.

The water is clean and cool as it washes over his tongue, and he holds it in his mouth for a moment before he lets it cascade down into his throat.

Percival’s shriveled belly fills with water as he swallows every drop from the cup.

The man sits on his heels and holds Percival’s arms as something clicks above him, and the pressure around his wrists vanishes. The man lowers his arms slowly; Percival gasps when blood rushes into his fingers.

He fills the cup again, and Percival tries to reach for it, to drink on his own, but his arms just twitch at his sides, too exhausted to move.

The man holds the cup, giving him just enough water to stave off of the little of the dry feeling that’s returned. He then holsters his wand.

“My name is Newt, by the way,” he says, massaging Percival’s arms and sending shockwaves of pleasure/pain down his spine. “I believe you know my brother, Theseus.”

Percival thinks back—how long ago was the war? How long has he been trapped here?—but he could never forget Theseus Scamander. The man was a machine when it came to fighting, willing to lay down his life for the no-majs who didn’t even know he was saving them, and an ass in every other respect, just like the lanky teenager he’d met briefly when his parents dragged him to England for a summer.

Percival cherishes every memory of the man: as good a friend as he could have ever asked for, even if his talent for bad jokes got old quickly.

He nods, still not trusting his voice. He’d never met Theseus’s younger brother, although he’d seen pictures of him.

The pictures didn’t do him justice.

“Healers are coming,” Percival hears from the doorway, but he’s too busy staring at the freckles that splash across Newt’s face to look for the speaker. They look like constellations drawn on his skin, like the stars he hasn’t seen since Grindelwald trapped him. He wants to kiss those perfect marks, taste the sweetness of Newt’s skin, drink down his voice the way he did the water.

His fingers regain some feeling, and he manages to curl them around Newt’s. His skin is mostly soft, but he can feel callouses as well, finds a collection of scars on that pale skin when he looks down.

Percival jumps when he hears a thundering of footsteps in the rest of the house. For a moment, he thinks it’s his heart again, but there are voices over it, and his heartbeat starts to pound in his veins in response to the noise.

He jerks Newt’s hand back, trying to pull him enough to put himself between Newt and the door.

Percival bites back the whimpers that threaten to escape when he tries to move himself instead; his legs refuse to move and Newt holds him against the wall.

“It’s alright, Director.”

It _isn’t_. Newt has a purity to him, a goodness, and Percival can’t let that be trampled by Grindelwald’s cruelty.

He fights against Newt’s hold, but his vision gets hazy when he leans over. All the fight goes out of him when Newt lets Percival fall against him, his cheek resting on that soft coat.

Percival forgets about the danger, forgets about _Grindelwald_ , when Newt presses a hand to his neck. He wishes it was his lips, but he’ll take what he can get.

The curtains flutter again, sunlight shining in Percival’s eyes. He lets out a breath and closes them, leaving only the feeling of Newt’s fingertips and coat, the musky scent of him, and the sound of Newt’s even breathing. Percival ignores the footsteps and the voices that come with them, more interested in Newt’s pleasant baritone when he says something, although the words are lost as Percival’s mind collapses into blankness.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I wrote most of this in one day and then had to choose what music the church choir that I co-direct (despite not being personally religious) would sing on the coming Sunday. Somehow, I wrote this the week of a water-themed Sunday in the Catholic Church :p
> 
>  
> 
> [Find me on tumblr!](lourdesdeath.tumblr.com)


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